


Minding Cues

by HolmesianDeduction



Series: The Streets Were Full of Strangers - A Prohibition Era AU [2]
Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Schönberg/Boublil, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1920s, Character Study, Developing Relationship, Genderfluid Character, Other, Prohibition Era AU, Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-17
Updated: 2013-07-17
Packaged: 2017-12-20 12:55:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/887522
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HolmesianDeduction/pseuds/HolmesianDeduction
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Azelma Jondrette has always had to rely on subtle cues to express what cannot, for them, safely be said aloud, and they're not entirely sure what to do with a lover who is capable of picking up on those cues.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Minding Cues

             Clothing is unreliable, and so Azelma Jondrette has always made use of certain cues to tip their lovers off. Most of these were subconscious habit – like the towels. If they came out of the showers with their towel knotted low on their hips, then as far as he was concerned, all bets were off, and anything was fair game; however, if they emerged with their towel wrapped securely around their body, cloth pressed against the flatness of their chest and tugged down to cover most of their thighs, then there were parts of her anatomy which were off-limits. Other cues could be found in the ways that they carried themselves, by the way they stood, how they chose to adjust a piece of clothing – regardless of what the clothing _was_.

             In the vast majority of cases, they fail to pick up on it and with few exceptions, Azelma grins and bears it without complaint – only because actively protesting is dangerous when your clothes are off and your gun is on the other side of the room, and even if it wasn’t, there’s only so many times, they suppose, that you can pull a gun on a man before it gets around that you’re prone to it.

             And in any case, most of them are gone after one or two ugly motel room trysts – they’re not worth more than that to them, and not a single one ever makes it back to the apartment that Azelma and their sister share. Not even the oddly pretty boy from The Corinth.

             For some reason, this one is different. He is cautious and hesitant, particularly at first – unsurprising since Azelma is almost certain that he never intended to fall into bed with them – and while it is initially frustrating to always have to lead the way, it becomes rapidly clear that his hesitation is as much out of carefulness as out of shyness.

             It’s for that reason that they keep him on for more than the usual two or three one-nighters.

             They don’t quite remember the night when they realised that he was picking up on their cues – only that they had gone into the shower after a show rather male, and come out quite definitely female, and that he had shifted to accommodate that without a word.

             What they _do_ remember is that it was after that night that he became a regular fixture in their little black book.

             They don’t know if they’re more impressed or flattered by the eye for detail that his ability to pick up on their cues indicates. He reads Azelma’s physical and verbal cues the same way that Azelma reads his background in the way he treats his possessions and in the tight control of his pronunciation – as if he were purposely suppressing an accent that he sees as undesirable. Sometimes, they consider asking him why he carefully hides the barely there, but still distinctly Irish lilt that slips into his voice when his control is loosened, either by sex or, on the occasions in which they can coax him into it, alcohol, but they never do – in part because it’s not their business, and in part because if they’re honest with themselves, they already know the answer.

             He never does make it up to the apartment, however. Not until it doesn’t matter, anyway.


End file.
